Men of Honor, Part II
by shandiss
Summary: When Hal's nephew struggles to deal with the aftermath of his deployment, a WWII veteran reaches out to guide him home. Mature themes, mild language.
1. Chapter 1

_The character of Hal belongs to Janet Evanovich. This work of fiction is not for profit or personal gain.__The people and situations are fictional and not meant to represent anyone living or dead. Please see the author's note at the end of the story for information on the man who inspired this story. __Special thanks to aruvqan for explaining the medals to me.__Title from Two Steps from Hell's "Men of Honor, Pt. 2"._

* * *

"_I want to say one thing to the veterans and military men out there. __I want you to remember one thing: __Never think you aren't important. You are very important."_

_—Jack Gutman, __US Navy  
__Normandy and Okinawa  
__Veteran and PTSD survivor_

* * *

A single thin ray of golden sunlight pierced the drawn blinds, the dust in the air sparkling in the lone beam as they danced upon the air currents in the darkened room. Tyler Reeves stared at it, a corner of his mind cataloging the movements of the glittering motes while the rest of his thoughts settled in a heavy, leaden spiral that had more to do with the shadows around him than the thin line of light.

He lifted the half-empty bottle of hard soda to his lips and swallowed mechanically. The tart taste stung his eyes, but he didn't blink. The minutes crawled by like a dying sloth as he watched the angle of the sun change and fade, and the liquor still wouldn't touch the hard knot of pain centered in his chest where his heart used to be.

The sound of a heavy engine slowing broke the silence outside, then it turned off the street and pulled to a stop in the driveway on the other side of the house. A muscle ticked in Tyler's square jaw, but his sharp blue eyes didn't leave the sunbeam and he sat in the old, comfortable chair in the same t-shirt and jeans he always wore, his feet bare and his sandy blonde hair cut in the same close, military style that he'd worn for the past eight years.

Eight years of losing friends and mentors to the bastards they fought in jungles both wild and urban, and wastelands that sometimes included sand and sometimes a population denser than Times Square at New Year's.

The lock on the kitchen door tumbled and he glanced at the simple arched door across the room. A heavy step sounded on the clean linoleum then the metallic jangle as his uncle hung the keys to his SUV on the board by the refrigerator.

A pause, no doubt as he took in the sight of the three empty bottles already gracing the sideboard. Tyler took another drink, knowing the expression that would flit over his uncle's open and usually friendly face as he realized that Tyler was home when he was supposed to be working, and had already made a dent in the household liquor supply.

Uncle Hal filled the doorway, a menacing bulk of muscles in the standard black uniform of his employer, the utility belt still around his waist. "Again, Ty?"

Another swallow, this time draining the rest of the bottle. He held it in his mouth for a moment, then let it slip down his throat while he considered his answer. In the end, it wouldn't matter. Uncle Hal would be furious however he framed it.

"Yeah."

His uncle sighed and unbuckled his utility belt, setting it on the floor as he sank into the sturdy chair across from him. "What was the reason this time?"

"Assholes who piss themselves when they're challenged, then go whining to the boss about unstable vets who threaten them." Tyler set the empty bottle on the floor, mindful that his uncle frowned on rings marring the pristine surface of Grandma Irene's end table.

Another sigh. "That's what assholes do, Ty. The key is figuring out how to shut them down without getting into trouble yourself."

"Don't care." Tyler risked a glance at Uncle Hal, the pain in his chest twisting a little when he saw the defeated expression. "I know you meant well, but I think it's time I get out of your hair. I'll go back home and find an apartment somewhere. I'm not yours to worry about."

Hal surged to his feet, an abrupt and ferocious motion. "You're my sister's son. You're _family_. And you're not just related by blood. You're my brother in arms."

A snort escaped Tyler before he could stop it. "Right. _The brotherhood of arms_. That's nothing more than bullshit and you know it. I don't want to be a part of any club that requires good men to die just so I can be a member."

"It's not like that—" Hal stopped himself and ran a hand over his short-cropped hair. "Ty, would you at least consider talking to someone? Keeping it inside of you is going to poison everything you've worked so hard for. It's poisoning _you_."

Tyler stayed silent as his uncle stopped himself and stared out the window for a long moment. When he spoke again, his words were measured but the tension in the set of his jaw belied the calmness in his voice.

"RangeMan has an outreach program that goes into the schools every year around Memorial Day. Veterans talk to the students and tell them about their service and what they've seen. Some of the guys are—"

"I don't think anyone is interested in what I have to say. All I can give them is blood and dirt and pain." Tyler thought about getting another bottle of the hard soda, then changed his mind. He'd need what was left of his wits to keep Uncle Hal from thinking this was a good idea and he didn't want the conversation to devolve into an argument about his drinking.

"I think that telling someone who has been there about what's eating you inside will help," said Uncle Hal quietly. "It helped me when I first got out, and every time since that I've come back from one of our contracting jobs. I can talk to the coordinator and set something up for you. Or we can go to the event and you can meet some of the men who are in the program."

"I'm not going," Tyler said flatly. "I'm broken, and there is no way to fix it or make the memories go away."

"That's not—" Hal stopped. "This isn't about fixing things, Ty. It's about starting the road back. Just—"

Tyler tuned him out, his mind automatically going to the sounds and the stench of the last firefight, when friends went down in screams and blood, their voices fading as their life ebbed away, only to return every time he shut his eyes to sleep.

And in his dreams, no one stopped screaming. Including him.

"—they've been there before."

He blinked, the heat and the bright desert light fading until he was back in Uncle Hal's front room, with no idea what had been said, and only sure that he wanted nothing to do with his uncle's well-intentioned but misguided attempts to wrestle him back into the land of the normal living.

Only he'd never be _normal_ and he didn't see any good way to stay _living_. The people in this neighborhood, in this city, didn't understand something that was so far out of their experience. Death on the scale he'd seen wasn't normal and it didn't belong in the same place as a school. Destruction like that needed to be kept far away from those kids so they would never know how brutal and cruel others were capable of being to the innocent. As for the guys who Hal thought could help him—well, their wars were long ago, and they couldn't understand what he was going through.

"I'm not going, Uncle Hal." Tyler made the statement in the flat, intense tone that meant business. "There's nothing for me there."

Before his uncle could protest further, Tyler got up and walked out of the room, heading for the fridge and fully intent on grabbing the rest of the hard soda so he could drink himself into oblivion before darkness fell. Maybe then the demons and the phantoms from the not-distant past would stay away, giving him a few hours of dreamless sleep before he woke in the cold harsh darkness before dawn. Like always, he'd watch the sun come up with the silent phantoms around him, staring at him with hollow empty eyes where their life used to be.

And bit by bit, as they crowded close, they took more of his life with them as they faded in the growing daylight, fading with the night and the shadows.


	2. Chapter 2

"_I want to say one thing to the veterans and military men out there. __I want you to remember one thing: __Never think you aren't important. You are very important."_

_—Jack Gutman, US Navy  
__Normandy and Okinawa  
__Veteran and PTSD survivor_

* * *

Tyler sat in the front seat of his uncle's truck and stared out the windshield, his mouth set in a grim line as Uncle Hal turned off the engine. The sunlight, not yet turned completely to summer's strength, filtered through a layer of lowering clouds, promising a grey day that would probably end in rain and gloom.

A perfect day for his mood, and a perfect day to stay far away from any talk of war or the military or remembering.

Uncle Hal didn't say anything, just got out of the truck and came around the front to his side. There wasn't much left to say; most of it had already been said and regretted until this morning when his uncle silently dragged him to the shower and supervised every damn little bit of his morning in order to deliver him to this school parking lot reasonably washed and wearing the freshly cleaned and pressed dress uniform of his service.

The door opened. "Let's go, Ty. We're early enough that you can talk to some of the men in the small gym while the kids get into their classes."

Tyler considered putting up another fight, but a glance out the windshield persuaded him to set that option to the side. Several black SUVs were already parked in a line at the back of the lot, and he readily recognized his uncle's coworkers. The dress uniforms they wore trended heavily towards Army and Marines, with a sprinkling of Navy; all of them were worn with the unmistakeable air of men who could easily deal with one stubborn veteran. If he wasn't going into the school, he'd be going somewhere else, and neither places were ones he wanted to see the inside of.

With a heavy sigh, he slid out of the truck, automatically straightening his uniform. Uncle Hal stepped back, giving him room and letting him maintain the illusion of being here under his own power. But there was only so long that he could stall, and Tyler ran out of time when Hal shut the truck door, leaving Ty exposed to the world and to the ordeal that stretched before him.

"Come on," said his uncle, and he was ushered towards the same door the RangeMen employees had already disappeared through. The walk across the parking lot—their shoes snapping out a smart rhythm even as the New Jersey weather threw wind and grit in their faces—didn't last nearly long enough. Tyler hesitated as Uncle Hal opened the door, his gaze falling onto the metal threshold that gleamed unnaturally bright, then squared his jaw and stepped over it.

This would be over soon, and then he could escape back to the liquor and his own private hell, and forget that anything existed except for the pain.

Inside was a short hallway, papered with children's drawings of suns and soldiers and happy faces. Scrawled in their looping, lopsided penmanship were messages of thanks and love, addressed to men and women they didn't know and perhaps had never heard of.

Tyler turned away from those bright colors, fastening his gaze on the heavy double doors ahead. The harsh light of old-style mercury lights shone through the safety glass in the narrow windows in each door, and as Uncle Hal pushed open the right side, he heard the echoes of voices talking and laughing in the space beyond.

The small gym had a tiled floor painted with circles and lines for a hundred different games. Metal folding chairs were scattered around, some empty and others pulled into groups for the old men and young who mingled, wearing uniforms with buttons and medals flaring bright beneath the lights.

Uncle Hal veered off to the right, towards a grouping of chairs with one old man sitting alone. His dark green uniform jacket was neatly folded over the back of the chair next to him, and his tie and shirt were crisp and precise even as the skin of his hands and face was wrinkled and mottled.

"Hey, Del," said his uncle, and the old man's faded blue eyes brightened as a smile lit up his face.

"Hal! Good to see you! And who is the young man with you this year?"

Uncle Hal stepped to the side and with a jerk of his head indicated that Tyler was to step up. "Del, this is Tyler Reeves. He's my nephew and is staying with me while he looks for work."

The old man struggled to get to his feet, failing the first time and sitting down hard before Hal nudged Tyler to the side and offered his muscular forearm for Del to hang onto. This time he made it upright, and patted Hal's arm before extending his hand to Ty.

"Good to meet you, young man. Army, eh? Good choice." Del shook Ty's hand, the touch of his cool, clammy skin sending a shiver up the younger man's spine. "Why don't you sit for a while? It's not often I get to talk with the younger men. They like to do their own thing, and don't have time for old men like me."

Hal excused himself, muttering some indistinct reason that would leave Tyler alone to fend off the well-meaning but ultimately useless advice of the old man. With an inward sigh, he waited until Del was seated again before choosing a spot two chairs over that might keep most of the words at bay. His back was rigidly straight, not touching the metal anywhere, and he kept his hands clasped straight in front of him. Everything about his posture argued against talking, especially inane chatter, and he hoped Del was mentally alert enough to catch the hint.

"So, how're you doing?"

Ty swung his gaze towards Del, gauging whether he could get away with just staring at him. But the old man smiled and waited, his age-mottled hands clasped in a mirror pose to Ty's.

"Good, I guess," Ty said, hoping that would be enough of an answer. "You?"

"Can't complain. The back's been giving me trouble, but at my age that's almost a given." Del's hands loosened. "It gets to the point where we get together like this and start listing everything that's not working any more. It's good to remember that enough is in good shape that we're still here."

That hit too close to the mark, and Ty glanced away, feeling the demons stir from that place deep inside. He had nothing to show for his time in the service, no gaudy scars that would scare off the faint of heart so they wouldn't ask questions he didn't want to answer.

"I remember the guys I visited in the hospital wards," said Del contemplatively. "Horrible wounds from artillery and shrapnel, tearing at arms and legs and chests. I met a sergeant once who had taken off his boots and wrapped his feet in rags because they were too swollen. Wouldn't go to the medics until his men were sent back from the beachhead, wouldn't stop and wouldn't quit, because there was too much at stake."

In spite of himself, Ty glanced down at the old man's feet, encased in carefully polished black shoes. He wondered if Del had hidden injuries sustained in a long-ago battle, and whether he had seen friends and squad mates blown to pieces by the uncaring enemy.

Del settled back in his chair, shifting a little bit to accommodate his aching back. Tyler didn't move, even though his own back was starting to hurt from his posture. Physical pain was easiest to overcome; he knew how to handle a body that tried to betray him.

The mind wasn't always so cooperative.

"I admired those guys who fought in the Great War—thought they were heroes," Del said suddenly. "I grew up listening to my uncles and older cousins talk about the places they'd been in Europe and it seemed like they'd been impossibly far from home. I remember—"

"Hey, Del!"

The shout across the echoing room interrupted the older man, and his expression brightened as he shaded his eyes against the harsh light to see the man walking towards them.

Tyler put the newcomer's age at around sixty-five or so. His light brown hair thinned at the top but his direct blue eyes were bright and alert. He was dressed much like Del, in dress shirt and pants with painfully shiny black shoes. He carried his uniform coat neatly folded over his arm and with each step of his right leg, the foot and knee twisted in an odd, jerking motion that made Ty's hip ache in sympathy.

"Swede!" Del crowed, struggling once again to get to his feet. "I haven't seen you in months! How are you doing?"

The newcomer shrugged as he hobbled to a stop. "Can't complain. Should have worked for the Weather Service instead of the Post Office. You know the forecasts would have been more accurate."

"Is it going to rain this afternoon?" someone in the next group of chairs called out. "I got ten bucks riding on the softball game at Legion park."

Swede spread his arms wide. "Sorry, Gary. Gonna clear up and be sunny through mid week."

The other guys broke out in laughs, kidding with the hapless bettor as Swede dropped into the empty chair between Tyler and Del. "Feels good to get the weight off it. I don't know what it would be like if I didn't keep it active."

"What happened?" Tyler asked, then bit his tongue. It wasn't polite to ask questions like that of a complete stranger. But the words hung in mid air, shaming him as the other man studied him for a moment.

Abruptly, Swede held out his hand. "I don't think we've been properly introduced. Kent Torgilssen, but everybody calls me Swede."

"Tyler Reeves," he answered, shaking the outstretched hand.

Swede nodded once and let go. "Army?"

"Yes, sir. I served in Afghanistan."

"Tough job," said Swede. "I'll take the jungle any time over those mountains. At least we were warm."

Tyler glanced at Del and the old man smiled and winked. "Swede was in Vietnam. Army chopper pilot."

As the younger man's gaze swung back, Swede shrugged. "I did okay. It wasn't as bad as on the ground. Those guys have my respect for wading through chest deep water and enduring those bugs."

"Some of the bugs were tasty," said the guy who had asked about the weather as he dropped a hand on Swede's shoulder. "We wouldn't have gotten out of there as fast as we did without pilots like you. You saved our bacon more than once."

"You returned the favor many times over. We weren't keeping score." Swede said it simply, smiling slightly at the man. "How're the wife and kids?"

"Keeping me busy. I think I'm doing more running to games and school plays now that the grandkids are older than I did with the kids. But I wouldn't miss it for anything." The man tilted his head towards the other group. "Can I borrow you for a few minutes? We need someone impartial to settle a question."

Swede nodded and climbed to his feet, the movement still graceful despite the old injury. "Tyler, good to meet you. Del, I'll come get you when they're ready for us to start."

"As long as you're not in charge of navigation, we'll be—" his friend said as they walked out of earshot.

Del was quiet for a moment, watching them join the other group. "Fifty caliber to the leg," he said finally.

"Sir?"

He looked down. "The injury. Swede was making pick up on a squad of men and took a bullet to his leg. Came up through the bottom of the chopper. But he got those men out of there and back to base safely. Gary was squad leader; he kept in touch with Swede and they've been friends ever since."

"Oh." Tyler couldn't for the life of him think of anything else to say. Helicopters were stubborn, finicky contraptions that were always looking for a place to crash. An injured pilot coupled with the humid, hot air of the jungle made a wreck almost inevitable.

Del shifted again. "The men around you may look like regular civilians, talking about homes and families and kids, but if you look beneath the surface, you'll see that they know the price of the lives they came back to. Friends, buddies, squad mates—memorials of stone mark their graves in cemeteries all over the world, but our memorials to them are different. We built ours with our lives, the lives of those we help, and the children yet to come. It's a sacred duty to us."

"Sacred, my ass." The words came out before he could stop them, bubbling up out of the bitter pool of bile that eddied and swirled in the noxious muck at the bottom of his soul. "There's nothing sacred about being the one who goes home while better men need a body bag for all the pieces."

The old man didn't answer right away, as if the anger Ty couldn't contain had warned him to tread carefully. He nodded to himself, part of a conversation with people no one else could see, and placed an unsteady hand on Ty's knee.

"It's not easy. In the heat of battle, you do what you need to. But that's not where your life changes. Every time you look at a buddy and trust him to watch your back, every time you fall down and still struggle to get up because the men are trusting _you_ to do your part—those little moments are when you change and get ready for the big moments."

Del sighed, a soft, wispy sound. "The little moments, Tyler. You gotta learn to recognize that just because you've been through some big ones doesn't mean the little ones don't matter any more."

To his horror, Ty felt the prick of tears stinging the corners of his eyes. He gritted his teeth, focusing on those traitorous drops until they fled and the walls he kept around his emotions were once again high and thick enough that nothing would get out.

He stared across the gym at nothing, silently glad when Del took his hand away. Clearing his throat, he searched for something he could say that would turn the conversation to safer directions.

"So, you fought in the war?"

"Not exactly." Del gave a small laugh as Tyler turned an incredulous look towards him. "I was in the Army, and I went overseas, but I wouldn't say I _fought,_ not like the brave men in my unit."

"But you carried a gun, right?" Tyler couldn't help himself. "You _could_ have fought if you needed."

Del shook his head. "Nope. I didn't need a gun for the work I had to do. Didn't need it at all."


	3. Chapter 3

"_I want to say one thing to the veterans and military men out there. __I want you to remember one thing: __Never think you aren't important. You are very important."_

_—Jack Gutman, US Navy  
__Normandy and Okinawa  
__Veteran and PTSD survivor_

* * *

"Well, I'd better hit the restrooms before we get going." Del clapped a hand on Tyler's knee, then heaved himself to his feet and shuffled towards the marked door on the far side of the gym.

Tyler didn't answer, lost in the struggle to process Del's authoritative words with the revelation that he'd probably never seen combat and hadn't even needed to pack a weapon to make it through the war.

_It's always the armchair soldiers who think they've seen it all._ The bitter taste in his mouth made him swallow, and he slouched back in the metal folding chair, not even caring any more whether he actually made it out of this room or not.

His lips tightened as a laugh rang out from the group of men in the near corner. They were probably a bunch of clerks and jeep jockeys, too, swapping war stories they'd heard but never actually lived, suffering nothing worse than a paper cut or a blister.

"Would you give this to Del when he gets back?"

He jumped to his feet, badly startled by Swede's quiet voice so close behind him. Twisting around, he met the other man's pale blue eyes, then dropped his own gaze to the hand held out to him. A dull gray pin balanced delicately between the thumb and forefinger, and Tyler blinked at the geometrical half circle above a triangle with stylized wings on either side.

"That's a paratrooper's pin," he said, his forehead wrinkling a little in confusion.

"It's Del's pin," Swede said. "He has a bad habit of selling off his memorabilia to help out people he's just met. We keep telling him to call one of us and we'll take up a collection, but he claims that he doesn't mind."

"Where'd he get it?"

Swede smiled, a thin, brittle expression that told Tyler the veteran heard the challenge beneath the question. "He earned it. Fort Benning with the 82nd. That's why it's so valuable. And that's why we've put the word out that if he sells it to let us know so we can buy it back."

Wordlessly, Tyler took the pin. He turned it over in his fingers, noting the little pieces of tarnish in the ridges that spoke silently of its age.

"Don't let that mild mannered exterior fool you," said Swede, coming around the side of the chair. The tension in his lanky body put Tyler on alert. "Del is tougher than he looks. He made it through North Africa and Italy. Even if that doesn't impress you, keep in mind that none of the metal he wears was given away for free."

"Didn't say it was." Tyler closed his fingers over the paratrooper insignia, the edges digging into his skin. "Doesn't change the fact that words are just words. Empty words."

The older man studied him for a long moment. "Del crossed the Waal River."

"A lot of people crossed the Waal." Tyler felt a flash of pride that he recognized the significance of the name. Operation Market Garden had been a vicious battle for control of the waterway's bridges, compounded by the entrenched firepower on the opposite shore. At stake was the continued momentum of the Allied drive. Miscommunications, lack of supplies and spotty intelligence meant that the success of the mission rested entirely on the courage and determination of the men on the ground.

_Some things never changed._

"Del crossed it in a canvas boat."

Swede lowered his chin a fraction and stared hard into Tyler's eyes. His spine instinctively straightened, driven by too many occasions where noncoms and officers alike had turned something similar on him. Didn't matter where, didn't matter how many deployments he had under his belt—every single time he reflexively went to attention to avoid calling down the wrath of God on his head.

He might be slow on the uptake sometimes, but he wasn't stupid.

"Maybe you don't know, but I'm going to clue you in on something that might have slipped past you." Swede didn't raise his voice, but the sharpness in it sliced through Tyler's defenses and struck home. "Del didn't have to go."

"Too small?"

The two words slipped out before Tyler could stop them, and he cursed inwardly as Swede took a half step towards him. The older man stopped himself, shaking his head a little as if to dispel the question and the tone it was asked in.

"Del had an iron clad reason to stay home. But he chose to go and he stayed with the men no matter where they were ordered. He earned their respect, and he deserves respect from the generations who come after them. Understand?"

"Yes, sir." Tyler didn't salute, but he could fake the correct tone as well as the next guy. It would satisfy whatever bug crawled up the older veteran's ass and give Tyler the space he needed to ditch the entire affair. Uncle Hal would be disappointed, but by the time he got home tonight, Tyler would be well on his way out of Trenton. Maybe he'd head back to Iowa, or maybe he'd find some place where no one knew him, and no one would care if one day he just wasn't there anymore.

Swede looked like he wanted to keep chewing him out, but the group across the gym was breaking up as the men started moving towards the door. Chairs scraped across the tiled floor, and the older man stepped back.

"Remember what I said," he warned Tyler as he limped away to rejoin his friends.

Tyler had absolutely no intention of remembering anything about this clusterfuck of a day. Once he crossed the city limits, it would all be behind him. All that would be left would be him and the phantoms who chose to stick with him.

A movement in the shadows along the far side of the gym caught his attention, and Tyler pulled his thoughts back to the present. Del shuffled across the floor, moving with the exaggerated care of a man not quite certain of his balance. He hesitated once, stopping to turn and answer a hail from another man, and for a moment Tyler thought he saw a flash of another man, upright and strong, striding through the carnage of war.

He shook his head as Del drew closer. Nope. No matter how good his imagination was, he couldn't make that image fit with the one in front of him—the frail, stooped figure that looked like a gust of wind could knock him over.

"Why don't you quit?"

Del glanced up from the floor, slowing to a stop as his expression changed to confusion. "Quit?"

"Yeah, quit. Give up on this plastic, fake do-gooder shit and admit you don't know what the hell you're talking about. Platitudes don't bring the dead back, and they certainly don't help the living." Ty's voice was quiet, but he might have just as well not been speaking at all for the reaction he got from Del.

The old man shuffled past him, reaching for the uniform jacket folded across the back of the chair. He half-turned away, blocking Ty's view, but the younger man caught a glimpse of the somber lines of his face and felt a pang of guilt for being too harsh.

"I won't quit," said Del, his voice muffled as he shook out the jacket and slid his left arm into it. "And I won't _ever_ give up."

The guilt turned to shock as Del shrugged the jacket over his thin frame and Ty saw the eagles on each shoulder.

_Oh, shi—_

Then Del shuffled around to face him, and Ty's heart plunged to the bottom of his soul as shocked realization followed it like a lightning strike. The medals resting over the old man's heart flashed in the artificial light, and the thunder of his heart pounded in Ty's ears.

Purple Heart.

Bronze Star.

Bronze Star.

_Silver Star_.

The darkness crowded close, the phantoms clutching at him with desperate fingers as Ty's gaze rested finally on the pins shining polished and smooth on each lapel of the old man's uniform jacket below the U.S. insignia—the unadorned crosses that explained so very much.

_I didn't need a gun for the work I had to do._

The salute was automatic, his spine snapping straight once again as Ty blinked back the tears of shame and guilt that welled up from the emptiness where the memories still shifted and grasped. "Sir!"

Del returned the salute. "I will _never_ quit, and I will _never _give up…"

He lowered his hand, holding it out to Tyler like a life line. "…as long as there are good men to serve beside."

Tyler looked down at the hand, wanting desperately to take it and let Del lead him back to the life he was losing bit by bit. _Wanted _to, but didn't know if he had the strength to make that journey.

"Little moments, son," the chaplain said quietly, "and you won't face the big ones alone when they come."

Tyler wrapped his fingers around the old man's hand, and the warmth and strength in the return clasp roused a hope in him that he never thought he'd find again.

_Many years later…_

Tyler Reeves held out his hand to the young man. The veteran's face was smooth and shiny where even advanced medical technology could not hide the radiation burn damage, and he looked back at Ty with dark eyes as empty and lost as his had once been, when he met an old man sitting alone in a school gym much like this one.

"Little moments, son," he said, thinking of Del, who never stopped reaching out to his brothers, even as his strength slowly ebbed and his body failed with age. "A great man once told me that little moments are where your life changes. Let me help you fight to change yours."

And he prayed as he waited, prayed that this young man would accept the offer and that he would be able to honor Del's dedication and great love by bringing another brother home.

The young man took his hand, and Tyler knew that he would face another battle, and that together they would win through.

Always together.

* * *

…_Captain Kuehl, Unit Chaplain, acting upon his own initiative and without orders of any kind accompanied the 3d Battalion, 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment in the initial assault wave of the daring daylight crossing of the Waal River…Captain Kuehl voluntarily remained on the flat, open shore for approximately four hours, rendering first aid to the many injured, supervising the evacuation of the wounded by boats, and aiding in the beaching of subsequent assault waves of troops. Captain Kuehl remained at his post despite the fact that he himself was wounded in the back by a shrapnel fragment and under constant automatic weapons and sniper fire…[his] presence and courageous actions served as marked sources of inspiration for all the assault troops reaching the precarious shore.  
_  
—_excerpted from the Silver Star Citation_

* * *

"_The Chaplain was everywhere he was needed often within range and a target of enemy fire. He was always looking after and ministering [to the] men._

_In testimony to his courage with the troopers in combat he was awarded the Silver Star for Gallantry in Action, 2 Bronze Stars for Heroic Action, a Purple Heart for Wounded in Action and 3 Presidential Unit Citations as part of his Regiment the 504 PIR. This is an extraordinary recognition of bravery for an unarmed Chaplain who continuously risked his life to be with his men."_

—_James 'Maggie' Megellas  
__ H Company 504 PIR  
_ "_Chaplain Kuehl 90th Birthday"_


End file.
